As soon as once more, the world is on the cusp of being taken over by the evil Normal Donald Morden and his Insurgent Military. Solely the Peregrine Falcon Squad, led by the heroic Marco Rossi, stand in the best way of the Rebels establishing their New World Order. This might be the plot of nearly any entry within the Steel Slug sequence, which is at its greatest whenever you don’t take it too critically. Steel Slug Assault Reloaded, a remake of a microtransaction-laden gacha tower-defence cellular sport, does its greatest to uphold the goofy tone of the sequence whereas stripping out the worst bits of the 2016 model.
A minimum of, it does its greatest to take the irritating bits out. The Swap model doesn’t have any microtransactions, fortunately – however it does nonetheless very a lot really feel like a gacha sport that expects you to log in every single day and grind your solution to victory. The result’s an uneven however nonetheless fulfilling sport that’s constrained by its origins.
![Metal Slug Attack Reloaded Review - Screenshot 2 of 4](https://images.nintendolife.com/screenshots/148578/900x.jpg)
Like many of the sequence that spawned it, the story of Steel Slug Assault Reloaded is paper-thin at the perfect of occasions. Marco Rossi and the Peregrine Falcon Squad lead the cost to cease the Insurgent Military from taking up the world. It’s unclear if that is meant to be completed by knowledgeable technique or brute power for the reason that gameplay that follows every brief cutscene is an train in sending wave after wave of models on the enemy till you handle to destroy their base. It’s the type of easy, senseless enjoyable that works effectively as a cellular sport however feels lacklustre when ported to a console. Even the addition of a ‘sequel’ story, cleverly titled One other Story, doesn’t change the truth that there actually isn’t sufficient plot to see you thru the dozen or so hours it would take to finish.
Every fight sees you buying models with AP (Motion Factors) and sending them throughout the battlefield, the place they may destroy the enemy base or die making an attempt. Extra highly effective models value extra AP, however you’ll be able to improve your base to help you regenerate AP extra shortly, permitting you to buy stronger models quicker. That reasonably fundamental circulate of gameplay is punctuated whenever you activate a unit or your base’s particular transfer, however you’ll spend way more of your time buying models to ship on a sluggish loss of life march to the best facet of the sector.
What little technique comes into the sport is de facto through which unit you select to take into every stage. Selecting a unit that may assault flying enemies isn’t normally obligatory till the sport throws a stage at you that options flying enemies virtually completely. Every unit might be levelled up, developed to a extra highly effective type, and given gear to spice up their stats. That is ostensibly completed within the identify of customising your deck to fit your play model however actually it’s a holdover from Steel Slug Assault Reloaded’s origins as a gacha sport.
![Metal Slug Attack Reloaded Review - Screenshot 3 of 4](https://images.nintendolife.com/screenshots/148579/900x.jpg)
Every time you full a mission, you’ll earn Medals and Tickets. Tickets are used to improve your models or base stats, providing you with an edge within the subsequent mission. Medals gas the sport’s gacha mechanics and help you pull for a handful of models, permitting you to unlock one of many sport’s over 300 characters from throughout the Steel Slug sequence to struggle in battles for you. Steel Slug Assault Reloaded is considerably much less predatory than most cellular gacha video games are typically, however that additionally highlights how superficial and plain unfair the system might be.
This technique is the explanation behind one of many greatest points with Steel Slug Assault Reloaded – the brutal and infrequently unfair issue spikes that seem all through the marketing campaign. Often, you’ll come throughout a stage that’s immediately far tougher than the earlier one. No quantity of technique in the way you deploy your models will assist. Usually, it’s a case of swapping out models in your deck with completely different ones extra suited to the enemy at hand. Nonetheless, it could imply making an attempt to tug for a greater, extra highly effective unit, a prolonged and infrequently irritating course of that was initially meant to encourage gamers to pony up cash to make sure a Uncommon or higher unit. With out the microtransactions, although, it feels unnecessarily harsh to the purpose the place it very practically breaks the sport.
![Metal Slug Attack Reloaded Review - Screenshot 4 of 4](https://images.nintendolife.com/screenshots/148580/900x.jpg)
Followers of the Steel Slug sequence will get pleasure from seeing among the extra goofy armies and models represented within the sport. There are the standard Rebels and Common Military characters, however you’ll shortly run into aliens from Mars, mummy canines, and samurai mechs alongside the best way. It considerably breaks the sport’s already flimsy plot to place collectively a military consisting of all these factions, however you’ll barely discover as you summon an enormous slug to engulf your enemies. The one draw back is that the roster is a mere fraction of the unique sport’s tons of of models.
If the story mode isn’t sufficient for you, there’s the choice of enjoying towards native or on-line gamers utilizing your chosen deck, although be warned – identical to some other gacha sport, there can be folks on the market who will grind for hours and can merely wipe the ground with you and your workforce. That’s simply the character of the sport, however, fortuitously, the net battles might be averted altogether in case you want to play extra casually.
When Steel Slug Assault’s servers shut down in 2023, followers in all probability thought their favorite tower defence gacha sport was gone endlessly. Sadly, they had been half-right. Because it stands, we’re not satisfied the hours of grinding wanted to advance the plot are actually price it.
Conclusion
Steel Slug Assault Reloaded removes among the worst bits of the unique cellular sport’s mechanics, however the scaled-back roster and brutal issue spikes spotlight the extreme grinding wanted to make these sorts of video games worthwhile and can in all probability fail to fulfill any however probably the most hardcore followers of the unique. For higher or worse, this feels precisely like a cellular sport that has been ported to the Swap, warts and all.